|
I have two questions about Buddhist philosophy. They're pretty big deals to me since they're the reason I'm not a Buddhist, but they might be inconsequential to you. (1) If all suffering is the result of attachment, what motivation can there be to alleviate others' suffering? I understand that suffering is an imperfect translation of dukkha, but even the mental pain experienced by someone who is injured or who sees a friend injured is arguably still a result of attachment. In the one case it's an attachment to the absence of pain, or to life, in the other it's an attachment to that friend and their well-being, or more likely to how that friend makes one feel. So how can helping the friend or curing injuries be justified except as a result of attachment? (2) Is Buddhism life-denying? I mean this in the sense that it perceives all attachment as suffering. If one surrenders all attachment, then one has no motivation to do anything. I can see the argument being made that all action is useless and achieves nothing, but this isn't satisfactory to me. It seems as if you'd have to either dedicate to wu wei or live a life of non-participation, i.e. a monastic life. Perhaps I'm too attached to my ego, but it seems to me that fighting a doomed fight for one's beliefs is superior to withdrawing from reality.
|
#
¿
Jul 22, 2013 10:03
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 1, 2024 06:09 |
|
|
Paramemetic and The-Mole gave very good responses to the questions I asked earlier in this thread, so thanks to them. They convinced me to take up certain elements of Buddhist belief, although I don't fully buy the metaphysics as I understand them. I'm still more of a monist pantheist (almost Taoist), but I don't think that's incompatible with Buddhism. My question's about meditation rather than doctrine though. Which forms of meditation do you find most beneficial for which purposes? Most of the time I practice emptiness meditation, which relaxes me wonderfully and helps me cope with almost any problem I have. However, my most profound meditations have been when I've meditated in a natural environment and reflected on the interconnectedness of all things, the illusory nature of distinctions between objects, predestination and the absence of moral law, and so on. I've also experimented with deity meditation a few times, and felt an extreme sense of energy - or light - building up inside me when I did so.
|
|
#
¿
Aug 7, 2013 23:42
|
|
|
I'm aware this isn't the 'talk about meditation' thread, but there didn't seem to be anywhere else to post this and wanted to know if this was usual. Some background information: I'd been considering the political implications of the fact that there is no self. I'd also been reading Cyberia by Douglas Rushkoff and talking (briefly) with some anarchist/leftist activists I know; I don't fit in so well with them because I think moral and political ideologies are forms of unnecessary limitation. Last night before bed I meditated with the specific goal of reaching into the collective consciousness. In line with my belief that there is no self, I don't bother with breathing meditation. It just tethers you to the body. Instead I focus on removing all thoughts and feelings that might arise until there is nothing left. The usual sensations happened: I felt I was sinking down through a series of levels. This is where the weird stuff began. I started seeing visions and hearing dozens of voices talking, like a crowd. The vision that stuck with me was this: the entrance to a club called Cyberia (heh). Its appearance was something between a masonic lodge and a nightclub: out the front were two vast blue glowing tubes. I tried to get in but my vision stopped when I tried to go inside: there was just this very vivid picture that remained. Then I fell asleep. Except it wasn't exactly sleep. I woke up several times in the night. Every time, I was instantly aware of my surroundings, as if I hadn't slept, as though I'd just taken a pause from being awake. I woke up much earlier than usual this morning but didn't get any sleep grogginess: I just sat up. It was like I'd just lay down for a second and was getting back up. Anyone else experience this? Either the unusual visions or the extreme lack of tiredness?
|
|
#
¿
Dec 8, 2013 11:51
|
|
|
Are there any convincing Buddhist responses to Nietzsche's claim that Buddhism is a life-denying religion?
|
|
#
¿
Jul 19, 2015 21:11
|
|
|
Okay, here goes. Bear in mind that it's Nietzsche so a formalised and precise argument is unlikely, but the rhetorical thrust of his arguments has always been convincing to me and led me much more toward Taoist texts than Buddhist. I find it hard to place where most of his arguments are located, as I don't have notes and I'm not a Nietzsche scholar, but I work in areas related to Nietzsche (power and structure-based accounts of knowledge). I also have personal reasons for believing Nietzsche's account: when I've been most in the grip of anxiety or depression are the very times that the Buddhist and Christian Martyr's accounts of unworldliness have seemed most attractive to me. At the start of The Genealogy of Morality, Nietzsche describes a new nihilism stemming from compassion and equates Buddhism with it: quote:Precisely here I saw the great danger to mankind, its most sublime temptation and seduction -- temptation to what? to nothngness? -- precisely here I saw the beginning of the end, standstill, mankind looking back wearily, turning its will against life, and the onset of the final sickness becoming gently, sadly manifest: I understood the morality of compassion, casting around ever wider to catch even philosophers and make them ill, as the most uncanny symptom of our European culture which has itself become so uncanny, as its detour to a new Buddhism? to a new Euro-Buddhism? to -- nihilism? He also describes Buddhism more explicitly as nihilistic and as a species of pessimism later: quote:[E]xistence in general, which is left standing as inherently worthless (a nihilistic turning-away from existence, the desire for nothingness or desire for the 'antithesis', to be other, Buddhism and such like) And again, he criticises Buddhism's mystical nature: quote:The supreme state, that of salvation itself, that finally achieved state of total hypnosis and silence, is always seen by them as mystery as such, which even the supreme symbols are inadequate to express, as a journey home and into the heart of things, as a liberation from all delusion, as 'knowledge', 'truth', 'being', as an escape from every aim, every wish, every action, as a beyond good and evil as well... the same feeling is expressed as that by the clear, cool, Greek-cool but suffering Epicurus: the hypnotic feeling of nothingness, the repose of deepest sleep, in short, absence of suffering -- this may be counted as the highest good, the value of values, by the suffering and by those who are deeply depressed, it has to be valued positively by them and found to be the positive itself. (According to the same logic of feeling, nothing is called God in all pessimistic religions.)
|
|
#
¿
Jul 19, 2015 23:10
|
|
|
Rhymenoceros posted:So "desire for nothingness/anithesis/to be other" is basically just another form of craving that leads to renewed existence (see This is fair enough and a decent response to Nietzsche, but what exactly is being 'let go of' here? It sounds as though it's the passion related to both existence and annihilation, in which case I find it hard to see how abandoning passion would constitute a response to life which doesn't align with a desire for annihilation. But I might be interpreting you (and Buddha) wrongly. Rhymenoceros posted:Nietzsche obviously wasn't a meditator, and he thought meditation was like sleep where you don't feel anything. But meditation is the opposite of sleep, it's a state where you are more awake, more alert and more aware. I used to meditate quite a lot, but I gave up because while it did make me more awake, alert, and aware, it also made me less empathetic, less able to feel strong emotions, and as a result less creative and less social. Perhaps I was doing it wrong (too ascetically?), however; I was always totally focused on removing my focus from whatever it was presently focused on and feeling nothing. My, and I think probably Nietzsche's, deeper concern is that by repudiating passion Buddhism also repudiates everything that makes life meaningful, thus aligning itself with annihilation. Beyond passion, beyond suffering, does Buddhism propose a compelling alternative? Or is it simply a rejection of these things?
|
|
#
¿
Jul 21, 2015 19:35
|
|
|
Just posting to say that I'm going to respond to the Nietzsche discussion when I have some time free; I want to have time to give the posters before me responses worthy to the effort they gave in answer to my questions. In case it becomes unclear, my aim isn't to attack Buddhism, but to understand and critically evaluate it. It's always been attractive to me, but I have major reservations similar to those which I have about Epicureanism or Christian Mysticism: as a consequence I've come to align myself with Stoic, Taoist and similar syncretic Pantheist / Animist traditions. I'm coming from a spiritually curious angle and was raised in a neopagan household, so I'm framing the debate somewhat in terms of Left Hand and Right Hand traditions, which my readings in Taoism and contemporary philosophical concepts of difference as unified whole have led me to see as two paths to the same destination, but each in their own way ultimately limited. e: This, for example, is what I meant when I said I was meditating 'too ascetically'; I was perhaps adhering more to right-hand (Christian?) values of oblivion and unworldliness than Buddhist meditation would countenance. After all, Buddhism is the 'middle path', and Buddha rejected the Hindu ascetics. Purple Prince fucked around with this message at 19:52 on Jul 22, 2015 |
|
#
¿
Jul 22, 2015 18:51
|
|
|
Josef bugman posted:I read a (rather bad) translation of the Dao quite recently and I can't help but think that a lot of it is just a bit bad when it comes to running a nation. "Strengthen the backs and weaken the minds of the people" definitely looks like a later addition by someone who had much too much interest in Lord Shang. Read the Zhuangzi as well! It's much funnier and clearer in relation to Taoist metaphysics than the Daodejing, and while the earlier books are essentially restatements and elaborations on the Daodejing in prose form, the later books are also chronologically later and have some interesting developments on the earlier books' themes by later Daoist scholars of the Warring States period.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 22, 2015 23:22
|
|
|
Josef bugman posted:I'll look into that, it sounds interesting. As Taoism is a folk religion, it's almost impossible to distinguish between 'actual Taoists' and supposed confidence tricksters. As far as I know, there was never a specific system of lineage or teaching in early Taoism the way there was in Buddhism or Hinduism: the modern schools of Taoism developed later as a result of the fusion of Taoist teachings with the imperial bureaucracy and Confucian academies. Early (or so-called 'philosophical') Taoism is also essentially anarchist in its outlook: for example, in the Zhuangzi there are numerous passages talking about how the discharging of duty is a misguided way for one to go about life. Instead early Taoist texts seem to promote the lives of itinerant teachers, hermits, and sages as the highest ideal. Even when advising on ways to govern, its advice is essentially that the best form of governance is that which allows nature and the Tao to take their course. The 'philosophical' Taoism you find in the Daodejing or Zhuangzi is a sort of codification of the metaphysical assumptions that were underlying folk practices of medicine and spirituality at the time. This is why it's a misnomer to distinguish 'actual' Taoism from the practices of shamen, sages, and hermits: they're one and the same thing. Likewise with the common trend in the West to separate the worship of gods and spirits from 'philosophical Taoism': this says more about the assumptions of the West than about Taoism itself. So the people touting mercury to the Emperors were almost certainly genuine practitioners of folk medicine, but whether they adhered to the specific ideas that we think of as 'Taoist' from the Daodejing and Zhuangzi is unclear and probably varied by person. For these reasons, a lot of Confucians hated Taoism: it specifically rejects the ideas of duty, law, and the academy which drive Confucianist thought and its historical link to governance. In many of the stories in the Zhuangzi, Confucians (including, in at least one case, Confucius himself) are mocked by Taoist practitioners as hide-bound, stuffy, and unable to understand the workings of the Tao because they're so in love with intellectualism. --- I'm not going to respond point-by-point to the kind posts in response to my questions about Buddhism, nor am I going to address the specific difficulties I've had with meditation practices (I think this is probably something I need to meditate on): instead I'm going to discuss some of the key points that both Paramemetic and Rhymenoceros made. The first question I want to ask is How is passion possible without attachment? As both of you seem to be fond of metaphors, I'll use my own to respond. We can clarify this by considering our attachment to life to be similar to a relationship. In a relationship, we might have long-term goals and short-term goals, but the thing which ultimately keeps the relationship together is this attachment. Saying "I have no attachment to you, but I have a passion for you" to your partner is liable to get you either slapped or laughed at, because 'passion' in this case can only be interpreted as lust. Likewise, if we lack attachment to existence, how do we feel passion towards anything we encounter in the course of existence? Outside the context of Buddhism, someone who says they 'lack attachment to existence' is liable to be considered a suicide threat; what makes Buddhism different? Surely attachment is necessary for passion. Paramemetic made a partial response to this by saying that 'if we reject those things, attachment, aversion, craving, and so on, then we can acknowledge the problem and cheerfully go about our lives mindfully attempting a solution but without suffering from it.' But this to me still seems like a nihilism, just a very happy type of nihilism. What reason do we have for attempting solutions to anything if we have no attachment to existence? Why would we attempt good works? In particular, why would we formulate long-term goals or strive towards anything if we are capable of enjoying the present moment regardless of its contents? In many cases, this seems to promote a passive approach to life. Faced with the suffering of the world and atrocities, genocides, and so on, would Buddha laugh? I'm bringing up a specific and ancient philosophical problem here, which is the question of eudaimonia versus hedonia in ethics. While Buddhism seems to be very good at promoting hedonia, which is to say momentary happiness and pleasure, it falls flat on its face when confronted with issues of eudaimonia. If you've ever read Brave New World it's also what Huxley is getting at: the society of Brave New World is perfect in terms of promoting happiness, but terrible at promoting things like art and personal development. It's also what motivates Nietzsche's comparison of Buddhism with Epicureanism, which claimed that the way to perfect happiness was not to indulge ourselves but to live an ascetic life reflecting on the cause of suffering. This motivates my final question: in light of the fact that Buddhism seems to reject the possibility of long-term goals, of personal development, of meaningful relationships, should we accept it in order to avoid suffering? That is, Is the loss of suffering worth the loss of passion? Purple Prince fucked around with this message at 13:49 on Jul 23, 2015 |
|
#
¿
Jul 23, 2015 13:43
|
|
|
Tautologicus posted:Are you asking or are you trying to tell the thread something. Cause that's a very leading question. Just come straight out with it lol I'm critically evaluating it -- it's just that my manner tends to be quite confrontational, which is why I put the disclaimer earlier about not attacking Buddhism. Consider it as scholarly enquiry; I'd be pretty happy if there were a good response, since then I could become a Buddhist instead of floating around in comparative religion.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 23, 2015 14:12
|
|
|
I seem to have made a terrible mistake about Buddhism's view of attachment, but at least I'm not alone in doing so. This article clarified it a great deal for me. You'd think having a degree in philosophy would teach me not to make assumptions about the definitions of words, but I've always been hasty to make judgements (it even ruins my chess play). At least now I have a starting point for re-evaluating my view of Buddhism: it also makes more sense to me how Taoist and Buddhist schools merged into Zen. Thanks much for your time, and sorry if I annoyed anyone too much.
|
|
#
¿
Jul 23, 2015 21:31
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 1, 2024 06:09 |
|
|
Friendly Tumour posted:I don't see a whole lot here that disagrees with anything I said. My point was that by dwelling so deeply on the role of the individual, Buddhism becomes incapable of offering tools to affect real and powerful change in society. The article I linked earlier (here, if you missed it) pretty much answers this by saying that the individual and society aren't separate: presumably with the correct understanding of no-self, alleviating the suffering of oneself and of society are the same task. e: Realised that this also answers your 'kicking puppies' question. If you feel neutral about kicking puppies it's because you have separated yourself from the awareness of their suffering; thus you're failing to adhere to Anatta. Purple Prince fucked around with this message at 11:54 on Jul 24, 2015 |
|
#
¿
Jul 24, 2015 11:42
|
|